Sweat Boy

There is this boy. At work. I had a crush on him for about a year before I even talked to him. His name is Sean but I have the hardest time remembering his name and always think that it's Andrew. Anyways, my roommates and I always refer to him as sweat boy, not because he's gross and sweaty, but because I used to have this insane reaction to this completely unfounded attraction and would start sweating whenever I saw him. Ridiculous, I know. That lasted a couple weeks and then I was just tired of it and got over it. Girls are so silly.

On a side note, I have this great nail polish (thank you mom and tim) that is glittery and silver, but turns pink when I'm in the sun. This is my favorite thing!! I love to keep one hand in my pocket when walking so I can compare the two colors when I'm back indoors--the pink on one hand and the silvery glitter on the other. Anyways, I was walking home with a friend the other day and I showed him my nails and told him how excited I was whenever they turned pink. He said it was the girliest thing he had ever heard of. Right. I didn't think I was that girly....

Carrier Pigeon?

My roommate Stacie is dating her ex-boyfriend again. It's not that uncommon around here. But we all love him and they're happy and it's great and everyone's fine. But this guy she's dating, Seth, has an old roommate, Travis. I went downstairs into the kitchen about a week ago to find Seth and Stacie conspiring in whispers, and looking pleased when they saw me descending the steps. Would I like to be set up with someone? Um....I guess...sure. Great! You and Travis will have so much fun.

I have a lot of fun interacting with Seth and Stacie. We all have the same kind of humor: dry, witty, clever, and yes, very sarcastic. After talking a little bit I realized why Seth and Stacie were so pleased for this set up--Travis doesn't understand sarcasm. Oh dear. S&S kept saying how Travis did not deserve me and how excited they are for us and how they're going to love watching us interact (we're gonna double).

So last night Seth called Travis and asked Travis if he was ready to feel extremely awkward, then handed me the phone. I accepted the phone while glaring Seth down. Hello? Hi. (Travis sounds like my home teacher Jaron.) Travis says "Seth said you wanted carrier pigeons, sorry I couldn't do that..." Yeah, Seth asked me how I wanted Travis to ask me out, and I responded carrier pigeons. Thanks Seth. "oh yeah that's fine, smoke signals will work great." "what will work?" "um...smoke signals...don't worry about it". Poor Travis. I'll have to tone myself down a bit for him on Friday, I think. So we had an awkward conversation, our momentarily dislike towards Seth being the only uniting factor. S&S like to repeat that Travis is very philosophical. Stacie suggests I jump right in asking him about evolution and the gospel. I anticipate having a lot of fun with this....

Social Psychology

Rocky is in my social psychology class. THE Rocky. Legend of the 80's Rocky. He plays for BYU football and his neck is thicker than my thigh. He struggles with putting four words together. He giggles, a low, reverberating giggle, but a giggle nonetheless. I love watching him in class and just like his interactions with other people, like when he came into class with sunflower seeds and offered them to those sitting around him, spittle and shell stuck to his face. Or the time our professor asked him if he had a girlfriend and he sheepishly answered no. I love listening to him talk. It's fascinating. My favorite moment was when I walked past his desk and noticed that he writes his notes in cursive. Rocky writes in cursive.

My professor in that class is very quirky, but not as fascinating. He may be as off as "Rocky", but he gets on my nerves while Rocky is entertainment. My professor is in his mid-sixties and loves to commit social blunders to get rises out of people. For example, we took a test in class a couple weeks ago (in class because he forgot to schedule it in the testing center) and he sat at his podium in the corner, legs crossed, shoes off, sporting his rainbow colored toe socks. Or when he confides in us that he wears sneakers to church. Or when he delights in embarrassing students (specifically enjoys commenting when he notices students flirting in class). I have learned from him that if I don't study well for my tests, I will be left "whimpering in my beer".

This is my class. I usually skip it about once a week. It's my only class on Mondays and Fridays, so it makes for an easy three day weekend. To make it easier, the lectures don't tell me anything the reading doesn't, and one of the books he assigned for the class is really enjoyable to read. Could it get any better?

Swimming Adventures

Last winter semester Morgan and I and our now married roommate Karen would go swimming early in the morning at the RB at BYU. Morgan and I decided to start that up again so tonight after dinner we went to the RB and brought along our roomie Stacie. Let me tell you, it was quite the adventure. Morgan's not a BYU student, so we hoped we could just sneak into the pool without too many questions. We never had a problem last year, but then again, we never had gone at night.

We got to the locker room and got towels from the front desk, no problem. Then we started timidly walking into the actual pool area, only to be stopped by an employee asking if we were there for water polo. No? Then where were our wristbands? Um....wristbands? An entirely new concept. So we trooped back to the front desk in the locker room and told them we had forgotten to get our wristbands, hoping that if we were friendly enough they wouldn't ask to see our id cards...right. We were friendly, and they were warm, and we made jokes, and they laughed at our jokes, and then we were sent back to our locker to get our id cards. Hmm. Stacie and I had brought our cards just in case, but Morgan of course doesn't have one. She did bring her id card from BYU Hawaii where she spent last summer term, so we hopefully presented that at the front desk after our two legit cards were swipped. No go. We were told our options for Morgan were to either use up our one freebie for forgetting an id card (we implied that Morgan was still a BYU student) or pay $5 for a guest pass. No thanks.

The nice front desk student directed us to the office to go to in able to get our pass. It just so happened that the office was clear on the other side of the RB....so we wrapped our miniature towels as much around our bodies as possible, gathered our dignity, and trod barefoot out of the locker room and down the hall full of steaming, sweaty, and seemingly staring students down to the office that seemed leagues away, our barefeet slapping the cold tile. One girl asked us if we were looking for the pool...no, thank you, we're not, but thanks for asking. Then another boy (I tried not to make eye contact with him, hoping he wouldn't notice us) recognized us and said "158th ward, 158th ward, 158th ward" each time pointing at a different one of us. Yes, thank you for noticing.

We made it to the office and I hid my arm that all ready had the wrist band, while Stacie told the student worker there that I had forgotten my id and needed to use my freebie. Morgan couldn't have done it because the worker looked me up in the student database. We walked back to the locker room and Stacie used her two hands to get my extra wristband off, which was promptly transferred to Morgan's arm.

Once in the pool we were only talked to once because Morgan was wearing a tankini, but then we were fine. Phew!

Dad's birthday

My Dad's birthday was a little bit ago (January 16th). I never know what to get him so I did the logical alternative and got him what I know I like :) I bought him a book from the BYU bookstore that I really like (The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis) and then had my roommate Morgan take a couple pictures of me mock reading it. Then I took those pictures and then a few other choice ones to Cougar Creations in the Wilk and had them laminated, explaining to Dad in his card that these pictures could be used as bookmarks. I also burned him a CD of some of my favorite songs. Cheap? Yes. Easy? Yes. But I really enjoyed doing it and I feel like he knows me a little better and we're a little closer. So here are the pictures I sent him:My friend Cade from the Brazil study abroad took me and another girl from our trip, Mary, to go shooting up by Utah Lake last September. We talked about doing it while we were dating, but didn't actually get around to it until after we broke up. All well. It was still a lot of fun!


Katelyn's (my 17 year old sister) clothing syle has evolved a bit with the years...



Katelyn took this shot of Brennan (10) for her photo class and I love it! It's such a genuine smile, which is rare on camera from him, as he's such a ham.


This resulted from studying in the library with a friend.



Jayden (now 14) thoroughly enjoying his chore. What a happy guy!

Funny prank! We "news-papered" a boy apartment and got so messy!!

My intellectual and reflective look.





Here's the list of songs that I burned for him. They're some of my favorites, but by no means comprehensive:

"Everything" Michael Buble
"Lollipop" Mika
"Eye of the Tiger" Surviver (The Rocky Story)
"Nobody Else but You" Goofy Movie
"Trabalhar iqual o meu"
"Look at me Now" Sixwire
"Stickshifts and Safetybelts" Cake
"New Soul" Yael Naim
"Everytime" Hawk Nelson
"Grace Kelly" Mika
"Con Te Partiro" Andrea Bocelli
"You Are Loved (Don't Give Up) Josh Groban
"Stay Beautiful" Taylor Swift (This song always reminds me of my step brother Corry
"The Call" Regina Spektor
"Garota de Ipanema" Chico Buarque
"February Song" Josh Groban
"Viva la Vida" Coldplay
"In Her Eyes" Josh Groban
"Elgar/Something Inside" Jonathan Rhys Meyers
"Love you Forever" I got this song from Jens, via Heather
J.S. Bach: Prelude, from Unaccompanied Cello Suite No. 1 In G Major, BWV 1007 Yo-Yo Ma